The metaphoric sponge (his knowledge of this pope's experience) will not be as thoroughly saturated as the protagonist would have liked because he wishes no longer to distract Adrian, acceding instead to his clear desire to return to his penance.

Virgil and Dante move along close to the wall of the mountain, away from the shades of the penitents, so thickly strewn upon this terrace but mainly near the outer edge. That avarice has affected an enormous number of souls was also clear from Inferno VII.25. And while Pride is often accounted the 'root sin,' another tradition gives Avarice that role. See Trucchi (comm. to this passage) and Giacalone (comm. to vv. 7-9), the latter citing the passage in I Timothy 6:10 ('Radix omnium malorum est cupiditas' [avarice is the root of all evil]) that helped form that tradition.

Virgil addresses Plutus, standing over the avaricious in the fourth Circle of hell, as 'maladetto lupo' (accursèd wolf – Inf. VII.8); the she-wolf (lupa) who blocks Dante's upward path in Inferno I.49-54 is widely understood to represent the sin of avarice. Here there can be no doubt: the poet apostrophizes that sin as being the most widespread among mortals.

The poet's second apostrophe seeks aid from above in the hope of defeating the scourge of avarice. Mattalia (comm. to these verses) sees these astral influences as executors of the will of God. Kennerly M. Woody (“Dante and the Doctrine of the Great Conjunctions,” Dante Studies 95 [1977]), p. 122, puts a finer point upon this view, arguing that Dante is here referring to the conjunction of the planets Saturn and Jupiter every twenty years. One such had occurred in Dante's birth year, 1265, in the constellation of Gemini (and thus in the period of Dante's birth); the next was scheduled for 1325, also in Gemini.

Even from the very beginning of the exegetical tradition, commentators, e.g., the Anonymous Lombard (comm. to this verse) and Jacopo della Lana (comm. to vv. 13-15), believe that this opaque question refers to the veltro (hound) in Virgil's prophecy at Inferno I.101, thus from this vantage point lending that passage a decidedly imperial caste. It is striking to find so much unanimity here, and so little there. However, if there the political figure was (as some believe) Cangrande della Scala, here it would seem to be an actual emperor, Henry VII, not merely a supporter of the Ghibelline position. Dante would have felt that Henry's advent was still in the offing, as it was until the autumn of 1310, when the emperor announced his decision to come to Italy; or else, if the passage was written in the spring of 1311, the poet, as in the view of Trucchi (comm. to vv. 13-15), was urging Henry to do what he had up to now failed to do, despite his presence in Italy: capture the city of Florence. In his seventh Epistle, Dante's initial enthusiasm for the imperial enterprise has been reduced to overexcited and dubious hope. See the notes to Purgatorio VI.97-102 and VII.95-96.

These two apostrophes in the mouth of the poet (vv. 10-12 and 13-15) are suggestively coupled; the first deprecates avarice while the second calls for divine intervention in the form of an imperial presence. We have just met a pope, who conquered the avarice that threatened to ruin him, but who, despite his best intentions, left the papacy vulnerable to the depredations of the lupa of avarice; we are about to meet a just king (in Dante's mind not in fact a king, but the father of a line of kings), whose France, in his wake, will do everything it can to collaborate with the corrupt papacy in its struggle against the forces of imperial righteousness.

The exemplars on this terrace are presented in an artistic medium that is parsimonious when compared to those we have been treated to on the first three terraces (see note to Purg. XVIII.99-138): here, a (temporarily) anonymous voice crying out the name and a single action of those who were noteworthy for their generosity of spirit. As usual, the first is Mary, here remembered for giving birth to the Son of God in a stable (Luke 2:7).

'Caius Fabricius, famous Roman hero, Consul B.C. 282, 278, Censor 275. During the invasion of Italy by Pyrrhus, King of Epirus, he was sent to the latter to negotiate an exchange of prisoners. Pyrrhus used every effort to gain him over, but Fabricius refused all his offers. On a later occasion he sent back to Pyrrhus the traitor who had offered to poison him, after which he succeeded in arranging terms for the evacuation of Italy by the former. He and his contemporary Curius Dentatus are lauded by Roman writers for their frugality, and probity in refusing the bribes of the enemy' (Toynbee, “Fabbrizio” [Concise Dante Dictionary]). The protagonist's special pleasure in hearing of him reflects some of the poet's nearly constant enthusiasm for models of Roman republican virtue. (For the extraordinary importance of Roman republicanism to Dante see Davis [Dante's Italy and Other Essays (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1984)], pp. 224-89; and see Hollander and Rossi [“Dante's Republican Treasury,” Dante Studies 104 (1986)], p. 75, for Fabricius's presence in four of the five collections of republican heroes offered by Dante in Convivio, Commedia, and Monarchia.)

Nicholas, whose gift-giving eventually made him the patron of Christmas, was a bishop in Asia Minor in the reign of Constantine in the fourth century. His renown for generosity is based upon his kindness in offering dowries of gold for the three daughters of an impoverished noble friend, who had been planning to sell them into prostitution in order to maintain them and himself. In the first two examples, poverty was itself seen as a sort of nobility, preferred both by Mary and by Fabricius to worldly wealth. Here things are a bit different, as Nicholas allows his friend to escape from poverty by arranging for his daughters' dowries.

Dante's two questions ('who were you? why do you alone cry out?') are accompanied by a promise to repay the favor of replies by procuring prayers for this penitent on earth. These three elements will structure the rest of the canto, given over almost entirely to the words of this as yet unnamed speaker.

The protagonist's last phrase, concerning the brevity of human life, is memorably echoed near the conclusion of this cantica (Purg. XXXIII.54: ''l viver ch'è un correre a la morte' [the life that is a race to death]).

Hugh Capet (we can infer that this is he from the next tercet, while he will offer a clear statement of his identity at verse 49) answers with the style of a man practiced in the ways of the political world. As a gentleman, he will respond to Dante only out of the goodness of his heart because he can see that Dante lives in grace; at the same time, like the pope who spoke before him (Purg. XIX.142-145), this father of a line of kings realizes there are few or none below who honor his memory. As he converses with Dante, we can observe that half of him lives in this new world of grace while half of him remembers the world he left behind.

As the ancestor of a line of kings of France, Hugh had a crucial role in ruling the land that now casts its desiccating shadow over the 'garden of the empire' (Purg. VI.105). We can imagine that to Dante, exiled as a result of French intervention in the affairs of Florence in collaboration with Boniface VIII in 1302, these words have a particularly bitter ring.

For the series of events in Flanders that culminated in the uprising of the Flemish cities in 1302 see Singleton's commentary (to verse 46). While the French did manage to hold on to some of the territory of Flanders, their military defeat at Courtrai in July 1302 must have seemed to Dante in some respects a punishment for what was done to Florence in the same year. Hugh's words ring out as a prophetic hope to see his descendants justly punished, but have a particular resonance for an Italian auditor. See Tullio Santelli (“Il canto XX del Purgatorio,” L'Alighieri 17 [2001]), pp. 21-23, for the political atmosphere of the Italy in which Dante was composing this very political canto, which Chiavacci Leonardi (Purgatorio, con il commento di A. M. C. L. [Milan: Mondadori, 1994]), p. 579, refers to as 'the last “political” canto of the Purgatorio' (although Purg. XXXII surely also has some claim to be so considered).

The speaker at last fully identifies himself as Hugh Capet, who was in fact king of France (987-996), even if Dante did not know him as such. 'The statements put by Dante into the mouth of Hugh Capet as to the origin of the Capetian dynasty are in several respects at variance with the historical facts, and can only be explained on the supposition that Dante has confused Hugh Capet with his father, Hugh the Great,... The facts are as follows: Hugh the Great died in 956; Louis V, the last of the Carlovingians, died in 987, in which year Hugh Capet became king; on his death in 996, he was succeeded by his son Robert, who had previously been crowned in 988 [to assure a Capetian continuity upon Hugh's eventual death]. Dante makes Hugh Capet say: firstly, that he was the son of a butcher of Paris (verse 52), whereas common tradition assigned this origin not to Hugh Capet, but to his father, Hugh the Great; second, that when the Carlovingians came to an end he was so powerful that he was able to make his son king (vv. 53-60), whereas on the failure of the Carlovingian line Hugh Capet himself became king (987); and third, that with his son the Capetian line began (vv. 59-60), whereas in fact it began with himself' (Toynbee, “Ciapetta, Ugo” [Concise Dante Dictionary]). Hugh's control of the power over kingship is the alpha of which the rule of Philip the Fair, the French king as Dante was writing, is the omega. For a treatment of the historical details see Rajna (“'Ugo Ciappetta' nella Divina Commedia [Purgatorio, canto XX],” Studi Danteschi 37 [1960 (1924)], pp. 5-20). On the particulars of Hugh's speech see also Riccardo Scrivano (“L'orazione politica di Ugo Capeto,” L'Alighieri 2 [1971], pp. 13-34).

Bosco/Reggio (comm. to verse 50) offer a list of the ten kings who followed Hugh to the throne between 996 and 1314. Four of these indeed bore the name 'Philip' and four, 'Louis,' but it is the last in each of these groups who may be of greatest interest. Louis IX (1226-1270) is one of the major figures of the Middle Ages, a great crusader, king, and saint. Of him Dante is – perhaps not surprisingly, given his hatred of France – resolutely silent; of Philip IV (the Fair – 1285-1314), he is loquacity itself, vituperating him several times in this canto, but also in a number of other passages (Inf. XIX.85-87; Purg. VII.109-110; XXXII.155-156; Par.XIX.118-120).

For Dante's repetition of this common error concerning Hugh's paternity see Toynbee's remarks in the note to verse 49.

Again Dante is misled, perhaps confusing events in the eighth century surrounding the last days of the Merovingian line, when Pippin the Short did put away his last possible political rival in a monastery. What Hugh had done was to have the last of the Carolingians, the Duke of Lorraine, imprisoned in 991. He remained in prison until his death a year later. See Bosco/Reggio's comment on verse 54.

Hugh's account of himself as kingmaker is, once again, not in accord with history (see Toynbee, above in the note to verse 49): it was immediately after he himself was made king that he had his son, Robert, anointed as his successor. Thus his account of himself as father of the first of the line is an unwitting act of modesty, since he himself was the first in it.

Hugh offers a brief and allusive recapitulation of four centuries of French expansionism, beginning with the continuing efforts to annex Provence, which avoided this fate until 1246, when a marriage between the brother of Louis IX, Charles of Anjou, was arranged with Beatrice, daughter of Raymond Berenger IV of Provence. And then, to make amends for this perfidy (per ammenda will be repeated, with increasing sarcasm, to create a triple identical rhyme, twice in the following tercet), France consolidated its territories by annexing three other territories that had been independent.

And now the really dreadful deeds begin: a descent into the Italian peninsula where a series of members of the French royal house named Charles are given employment by being sent into Italy: Charles of Anjou, who is blamed for killing Conradin (the last hope of Italian Ghibellinism) at Tagliacozzo in 1268 (see Inf. XXVIII.17-18) and for poisoning Thomas Aquinas in 1274 (a rumor that appears to have been made out of whole cloth as part of Italian anti-French propaganda, but which Dante seems only too willing to propagate). Then Charles de Valois will take (we are once again in the realm of post-factum prophecy) Florence in 1301 on behalf of an alliance among the French, the papacy of Boniface, and the Black Guelphs of Corso Donati; it is not difficult to imagine Dante's outrage at the intervention of this second Charles. Finally, the third of these wretched Frenchmen, Charles II, son of Charles of Anjou and king of Naples, is brought on stage to suffer Dante's taunts, delivered by this French version of Dante's ancestor Cacciaguida (see Par. XV-XVII), a benevolent ancestor of (in this case) an undeserving descendant. This Charles is portrayed as, after having lost a calamitous naval battle during the Sicilian Vespers in 1284 and, as a result, being held prisoner on his own ship, selling his daughter (there having been no intervention from St. Nicholas on his behalf, we may assume) into matrimony with Azzo VIII of Este in 1305.

Hugh's first apostrophe of Avarice parallels Dante's at vv. 10-12.

And now the worst of all the French arrives for his excoriation, King Philip IV (see note to Purg. VII.103-111 and to vv. 50-51, above). This king, who had been excommunicated by Boniface as a result of their dispute over the French king's desire to tax the clergy, had his revenge when, in September 1303, the king's representative, William of Nogaret, accompanied by an Italian ally, Sciarra Colonna, a member of the family that Boniface, aided by the advice of Guido da Montefeltro, had harmed (see Inf. XXVII.102), arrived in Anagni with a force of soldiers and, after physically assaulting the elderly pope, imprisoned him in his own palace, which they sacked. Boniface was eventually freed in a popular uprising against these intruders and made his way to Rome. But the insult to his person, both physical and spiritual, was apparently so great that he died on 12 October 1303. For a description in English of the outrage done to Boniface see Carroll's commentary (comm. to vv. 85-96).

Dante was no admirer of Boniface. The French attack upon the person of the pope, however, was an attack upon the holy office itself, and thus upon the Mystical Body of Christ, the Church. And thus Boniface is compared to Christ betrayed by Pontius Pilate and crucified, while the agents of Philip become the two thieves present at that event, but now represented as part of the torture administered to their victim.

For the possible dependence of Dante's verses here on a poetic prayer to the Virgin composed by Boniface see Moore (Studies in Dante, Second Series: Miscellaneous Essays [Oxford: Clarendon, 1968 (1899)], pp. 396-97); for the text of this poem see Robert Artinian (“Dante's Parody of Boniface VIII,” Dante Studies 85 [1967], pp. 71-74).

The 'new Pilate' now directs his rage against the Templars. (For a more balanced view than Dante's of Philip's motives see Scott [Dante's Political Purgatory (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1996)], pp. 174-77.) 'The Knights Templars were one of the three great military orders founded in Cent. xii for the defence of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem. After having existed as a powerful and wealthy order for nearly two centuries they were in 1307 accused by Philip the Fair of heresy, sacrilege, and other hideous offences, in consequence of which he ordered their arrest, and by means of diabolical tortures wrung from them confessions (for the most part undoubtedly false) of their alleged enormities. Five years later, at Philip's instigation, they were condemned by Clement V, and the order was suppressed by decree of the Council of Vienne (May, 1312); in the following year the Grand Master, Du Molay, was burned alive at Paris in the presence of the king. The French king's motive in aiming at the destruction of the Templars was, it can hardly be doubted, a desire to get possession of the immense wealth of the order, as is implied by Dante, and stated in so many words by Villani (viii.92)' (Toynbee, “Templari” [Concise Dante Dictionary]). When did Dante write this passage? Clearly sometime after 1307; and, perhaps nearly as clearly, before 1312. It is notable that none of the details of the denouement of this ugly scheme reached Dante's page: sanza decreto (unsanctioned) the king sets out without the papal support necessary to justify such an action (it would come from that other detested Frenchman, Pope Clement V, only in 1312).

Hugh's second apostrophe parallels Dante's (vv. 13-15) in hoping for divine vengeance to descend from above and smite the guilty, in this case most particularly Philip the Fair.

There are questions as to whether the poet meant the reader to think of the 'vengeance' as reflecting his defeats in Flanders in 1302 (see Singleton [comm. to verse 96]), or Philip's death while hunting, when his horse was overturned by a charging boar, in 1314 (the opinion of John of Serravalle [comm. to these verses]), or neither of these events. As Trucchi (comm. to these verses) points out, Dante clearly refers with joy to Philip's death in November 1314 at Paradiso XIX.118-120. The notion that God's vengeance for the events at Anagni in 1303 occurred in Flanders in 1302 hardly seems acceptable. Further, as Bosco/Reggio (comm. to these verses) argue, since Dante does refer to Philip's death in the next cantica, it only makes sense to believe that he did not yet know of it when he wrote this passage, for it would have been much too tempting a piece of information not to include. In any case, the result is as Dante probably would have wanted anyway; here he predicts only that such outrageous behavior will receive God's eventual vengeance – it is but a matter of time. This seems the best understanding. The gleeful passage in Paradiso banks the promissory note that Dante writes us here.

Scartazzini (comm. to verse 95) was perhaps the first to cite, as a source for the oblique phrasing of this tercet, which causes some readers difficulty, Psalm 57:11 (58:10): 'Laetabitur iustus cum viderit vindictam' (The just man shall rejoice when he witnesses his revenge).

At verse 35, Dante had inquired as to the speaker's identity; it has taken Hugh sixty-two lines to answer him by including the history of France's decline as a narrative of a family's woe, from his virtue to Philip's savagery, in just over three hundred years. Needless to say, for Dante, Hugh's tale is still more important as the record of what went wrong for Italy, drawing her from her Roman-imperial destiny toward her near death (see Purg. VII.94-96), because of France's malfeasance.

To answer Dante's second question, caused by his sense that only one penitent seemed to be crying out the names of the generous, Hugh is equally contorted and long-winded, only clearing up Dante's miscomprehension at vv. 118-123. When he uttered the name of Mary (verse 19) he did what he and his companions do during the day, i.e., name the exemplars of generous lives; at night they turn from names that serve as 'goads' to those that serve as 'bridles,' those of the avaricious.

For Mary as 'bride of the Holy Spirit,' Singleton (comm. to vv. 97-98) cites Matthew 1:20: 'For that which is begotten of her is of the Holy Spirit.'

This is Dante's most 'crowded' group of exemplary figures in Purgatorio, eight of them presented in fifteen lines. Once again he divides his cast into biblical and pagan personages, here not in parallel pairings (as in Purg. XII.25-60) but chiastically:

Pygmalion (Virgil)
Midas (Ovid)
 Achan (OT)
 Ananias (NT)
 Saffira (NT)
 Heliodorus (OT)
Polymnestor (Virgil, Ovid)
Crassus (Cicero? )

Virgil's tale of Pygmalion's avarice (Aen. I.340-364) is narrated by Venus to Aeneas. Pygmalion was king of Tyre and brother of Dido, married to wealthy Sychaeus. Pygmalion secretly murdered Sychaeus, whose shade then appeared to reveal everything in a dream to Dido, who consequently made off, with Sychaeus's hidden stores of wealth, to her new life in Carthage, thus depriving Pygmalion of the gold he sought.

Two back-to-back Ovidian narratives involving Midas (Metam. XI.100-193) may here be condensed into a tercet. In the first Bacchus allows Midas his famous 'touch,' turning all to gold with disastrous results once he realizes he can no longer eat nor drink, and has to ask to have his gift withdrawn; in the second Apollo metamorphoses Midas's ears into the enormous ears of an ass because Midas, alone among the listeners, insisted on his opinion that Pan's piping was more beautiful than Apollo's playing of his lyre. Dante refers to this scene in his second Eclogue (Egl. II.50-53). It is not clear whether Midas is laughable only for his foolish avarice or for his ass's ears as well.

Achan's theft of the treasure of the Israelites and its result (his being stoned to death by command of Joshua) is the subject of the entire seventh chapter of Joshua (7:1-26).

Ananias and his wife, Sapphira, having sold some of their land to make a donation in support of the young Church, kept back part of the price for themselves. Peter, reading their hearts, tells first Ananias and then his wife that he realizes they have lied; as a result, each drops dead before him from shame (Acts 5:1-11).

Heliodorus was sent by his king, Seleucus IV of Syria, whom he served as treasurer, to take possession of the treasure in the temple in Jerusalem. Entering the sacred precinct for such purpose, he is assaulted by a terrifying figure on horseback and by two young men who beat him (II Maccabees 3:7-40).

Polymnestor murdered Polydorus for the gold of Troy that the young son of Priam was sent with, while supposedly under the protection of the Thracian king (see Inf. XIII.31-39 and note; Inf. XXX.18-19). Dante's sources include Virgil (Aen. III.22-48) and Ovid (Metam. XIII.429-438).

Marcus Licinius Crassus, known as 'Dives' (the rich man), the name reflecting his reputation for avarice. He had a successful political career, becoming triumvir with Caesar and Pompey in 60 B.C. (all three were reconfirmed in 56). In 55 he became proconsul in Syria. Trapped in an ambush by the warring Parthians, he was killed, and his severed head and one hand were sent back to the Parthian king, Orodes, who then had his mouth filled with molten gold. There is unresolved discussion of Dante's likely source for this tale, with candidates being Paulus Orosius, Historiae adversus paganos; Lucius Annaeus Florus, Epitome de Tito Livio; Cicero, De officiis. The Latin phrasing most cited is 'aurum sitisti, aurum bibe' (you thirsted for gold, now drink it) used to refer to the Parthian king's treatment of Crassus's head. A number of early commentators cite these words without ascribing them to any source, e.g., Jacopo della Lana (comm. to these verses) the Codice Cassinese (to verse 116), and Benvenuto da Imola (to these verses). However, beginning with Sapegno (1955) several more recent glossators do claim a dependence on De officiis I.30. For the importance of Florus as source for much of Dante's Roman history, see Antonio Martina, “Floro” (ED.1970.2), pp. 948-52. For Dante's earlier readings in De officiis see Simone Marchesi (“La rilettura del De Officiis e i due tempi della composizione del Convivio,” Giornale storico della letteratura italiana 178 [2001], pp. 84-107).

Hugh finally explains the reasons for his seeming to have spoken alone when Dante first observed him. What can we deduce from the fact that he, of all the penitents, is the most moved to call upon the positive examples of generosity? Perhaps we are meant to understand that he, burdened by his thoughts of the terrible avarice of his French descendants, is the one most moved at this particular moment.

Porena (comm. to vv. 121-122) disputes Rajna's notion (“'Ugo Ciappetta' nella Divina Commedia [Purgatorio, canto XX],” Studi Danteschi 37 [1960 (1924)], pp. 5-20) that, on the basis of a chanson de geste concerning Hugh in which he is portrayed as dissipated, he is presented by Dante as repining his prodigality rather than his avarice. Hardly anyone today accepts this theory, since until Canto XXII there will be no mention of prodigality on this terrace. Further, it would not be in the spirit of this fraternal place for Hugh to inveigh against those who had committed sins so different from his own. Benvenuto (general note to Purg. XX) is of the opinion that this canto deals with avarice, the next one with prodigality.

In contrast to his unenthusiastic departure from Pope Adrian, Dante's leaving of Hugh Capet is quick and purposive. Perhaps the difference in the two interviews is that this one has come to a sense of completion, while Dante still longed to know more of Adrian's life at the end of his discourse.

The sudden shift in focus to Dante's fearful condition in response to this earthquake opens an entirely new chapter in the narrative, a unique one. As Philip B. Miller observed in conversation many years ago, Statius's completion of penance is the only genuine event that occurs involving a damned or a saved soul in the entire Commedia. (Discussion of Statius awaits the next canto.) All else in the poem that passes for narrative action pertains to demons or angels interacting with Dante, Virgil, or the souls whom they help to punish to serve, to Dante's own difficulties or successes in moving on, or else represents some form of ritual performance by the souls in the afterworld for the benefit of onlooking Dante. Dante, still a stranger on this magic mountain, responds by feeling like a man in fear of death. We shortly learn that he is witness to a moment of completion, of resurrection. It takes a while for this to become clear.

Benvenuto (comm. to these verses) understands the simile as having the following meaning: 'Just as that most renowned island, Delos, once sent forth the two most famous luminaries into the sky [Apollo and Diana, the sun and the moon], so now this most renowned mount of purgatory was sending into the heavens two very famous poets, one ancient, i.e., Statius, and one modern, i.e., Dante. I speak not of Virgil, for he did not go to heaven.' The commentary tradition is, nonetheless, a seedbed of confusion for interpreters of these verses. The following things are among those variously said: (1) Delos was made stable by Jove so that Latona, pursued by jealous Juno, could give birth in peace; (2) before Latona gave birth, Delos suffered no such quaking; (3) the island became stable only when Latona arrived to give birth on it; (4) Apollo later made the wandering island stable out of pietas (the version sponsored by Aeneid III.73-77). Either the third or this last, partly because of its Virgilian authority, seems the best to follow. The mountain's wild quaking reminds the poet of the agitated condition of the floating island, which welcomed Latona for her parturition, before it was made fast, either by her arrival or, later, by Apollo.

For passages in the Old Testament anticipating Dante's supernatural earthquake see Patrick Boyde (Dante Philomythes and Philosopher: Man in the Cosmos [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981]), pp. 93-95.

Once again a tercet is devoted to Dante's apparent fear and now to Virgil's miscomprehension of what is happening, since he, too, thinks that fearful thoughts now are understandable, if not welcome.

The passage in Luke 2:13-14 presenting angelic praise of God at the birth of Jesus ('Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men of good will') is cited first by Pietro di Dante (Pietro1, comm. to these verses). By comparing himself and Virgil to the shepherds that first heard the angelic Gloria (Luke 3:15), Dante has underlined the connection between Jesus and Statius, which will be evident in the next canto as well. The birth of Jesus stands as a sign for the rebirth of this soul, who has finished his purgation and is prepared to ascend to the Father. All on the mountain apparently cease their own penitential activity to celebrate the event in this song, and do so until the quaking stops; we are led to imagine that this is true each time a soul arrives at this joyful moment of freedom from even the memory of sin, a condition that is formally completed with the passage through the waters of Lethe in the earthly paradise.

Scott (Dante's Political Purgatory [Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1996]), pp. 174-75, citing the previous remark in Pézard's commentary (Dante Alighieri, Oeuvres complètes [Paris: Gallimard, 1965]), p. 1266, rightly points out that the earthquake at Statius's 'resurrection' remembers that which occurred at the crucifixion of Jesus, so that Christ's conquest of death is now literally played out before our eyes in a single modern Christian life. See also Gmelin (Kommentar: der Läuterungsberg [Stuttgart: Klett, 1955]), p. 328; Hollander (Allegory in Dante's “Commedia” [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969]), pp. 67-68; and a later version of Scott's remarks (“Dante's miraculous mountainquake,” Electronic Bulletin of the Dante Society of America [October 1996]).

At the cessation of the celebrative singing all return to their usual practice, including the two travelers.

Dante for the first time underlines his unusual (even for him) curiosity to know the meaning of the things he has just felt and heard. Tommaseo (comm. to vv. 145-147) noted the echo here of Wisdom 14:22, 'in magno viventes inscientiae bello' (they live in a great war of ignorance).

The need to press on leaves Dante suspended – and the reader, as well.